How Michigan Is The Perfect Home For Writers

Writers are those who want to convey their thoughts, perceptions and feelings through certain forms like novels, short stories, blogs, and the like. Writers are those who are inclined to convey their message to the world. The context of their message should be imperative and helpful. Considering that the functions of writers are very important in this world, it is a must for them to see to it that the location where they would spend their time in writing should be very suitable. And this is how the State of Michigan is the perfect home for novel writers.

There are 5 certain facts written and explained below why Michigan is the perfect home for writers.

Michigan environment is always conducive to writing. Conduciveness is the first thing that every novel writer has to consider. The climatic condition really matters as far as having a beguiling and worth-reading novel is concerned. Michigan is the perfect home for the writers, because the climatic condition in this area is really fit for writing.

Michigan has a lot of things to offer for the writers to write well their masterpieces. Michigan is one of the most livable places in the country, because of its capability to offer things suitable to all writers. The pride of this state has been known already and widely. One of the best things it can offer is local flair. And the locally made LivnFresh t-shirts, are among the best products that are made in Michigan. Wearing one, writers can wear comfortably dive into the Michican experience during summer. So writing during summer is still accompanied by comfort and convenience.

LivnFresh T-shirts really make the Michigan-based writers so amazing. There are various types of michigan pride gear, and one would typically wear one when they want to show off their pride of being from or visiting Michigan. The creators of this local brand of t-shirt did make sure that the writers can have a perfect clothing.

Clothing during summer writing is a crucial thing, because it is attached to the internal calmness and relaxation of both body and mind. Once the t-shirt the writers are wearing is really comfortable, for instance made up of 100% pure cotton, then there’s always comfort and pacification of the mind. This is essential to coming up with a perfect write-up every day.

Of course comfortable clothing is not the only thing that a writer needs.  He or she also often needs a comfortable pair of glasses.  But what about if you are a child needing glasses?  Well, stylish frames were hard to come by until Michigan couple Ben and Laura Harrision of Jones Paul Eyewear started their own fashion glasses company for children. Michigan really is a hot bed of innovation and creativity. So if your little writer needs glasses, make sure you go visit them.

Sometimes you may want to write outside of your vacation home or hotel room and for that you need to get out and gain some experiences to write about. There are some hangout locations in Michigan for the writers to unwind and relax regularly. There are famous hangout bars and nightlife areas here. These hangout locations serve as one of the pride and honor of this state. The famous hangout areas here are Hoppy’s Bar, The Tap Room, and Quinn and Tuite’s Irish Pub.

Life in Michigan is really great. Life greatness is what every person aspires for. Life greatness refers to the abundance of things that may lead to happiness and satisfaction. For writers, it is important to be happy and satisfied always. So any novel writer can have a wonderful time here because of the offered satisfying and elating things, like the natural parks (i.e. Isle Royale National Park) and the savory cuisines (i.e. Stanley’s Famous Restaurant).

They all say that writing is a passion and not an option. It might be true or not. For some, writing can be learned. But for others, writing should be a passion. Either of the two, writing novels, short stories and any other literary works can be done excellently once Michigan is chosen as the place to execute the writing. The things explained above are the reasons why and how the State of Michigan is reflected as the perfect home for writers.

There comes a time when I have so much news for a Fusenews that it paralyzes me and rather than write one up I just let my files accrue more and more schtoof until the vicious circle ends with a massive deletion.  Today some of this stuff will strike you as a bit out of date, but the bulk is pretty darn fun.

• Anytime I write a post that involves race in some way I gird my loins and prepare for the worst.  The worst did not occur yesterday, however, when I wrote about moments of surprising racism in classic children’s books.  Perhaps everyone was distracted by Jonathan Hunt’s post on The Present Tense.  Now THAT is a hot and heavy discussion!

• Writing a children’s novel in the present tense is one thing.  Including cursive in picture books?  That’s another.

• Oh, Cotsen Children’s Library.  Is there anything you can’t do?  Because, to be perfectly frank, I think even the prospect of interviewing Philip Pullman would render me effectively mute.  And then there was that AMAZING piece on the woman who makes Harry Potter miniatures.  Seriously, this is your required reading of the day.

• Oh fine.  It’s not really the required reading.  I mean, it’s cool and all but if we compare it to the René Saldaña, Jr. piece Forgive Me My Bluntness: I’m a Writer of Color and I’m Right Here In Front of You: I’m the One Sitting Alone at the Table then there’s no question what post you absolutely must read today.

• Because I love Kalamazoo in all its myriad forms, this caught my eye.  For you Michiganders out there:

In February 2014, 95 youth librarians, youth library workers, and students gathered at Clinton-Macomb Public Library for a truly excellent day of professional development, idea-sharing, networking, and learning, unconference style. In 2015, we’ll gather April 24th at Kalamazoo Public Library. Hosted by Lisa Mulvenna (Clinton-Macomb PL), Anne Clark (Alice and Jack Wirt PL, Bay City), and Andrea Vernola (Kalamazoo PL), the MI KidLib Unconference will feature relevant and engaging sessions decided on by participants at the conference. And as is typical of an Unconference, it’s FREE to attend. Registration begins in January 2015.

Here are the session notes from last year in case you want to see what we learned together. We hope you’ll join us and spread the word to anyone who’s interested in youth services in libraries!

• If you had told me even two years ago that I would be the de facto mathematics librarian, ideal for moderating events like the Science & Mathematics Panel of Jordan Ellenberg, “Science Bob” Pflugfelder, and Benedict Carey at the Penguin Random House Author Event for NYC Educators, I would have been utterly baffled.  And yet here we are.  Know any teachers in the NYC area?  Because the whole kerschmozzle appears to be free.

• Things That I Didn’t Know Existed Until Recently: Apparently the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center created a site called BookDragon that seeks to create a site for multicultural children’s literature.  And not just of the Asian Pacific nature either.  It’s a true multicultural site and a fun one to scroll through.  Check it!

• This came out a while ago so I’m sure you already saw it, but just in case you didn’t, the Marc Tyler Nobleman Kidlit Mashups are nothing short of inspired.

Go!  Play!

• My sister wrote me the other day to ask for a recommendation of a great children’s book about a jellyfish.  I complied then found out why she wanted to know.  I love it when she succeeds in her crazy plans on her blog but truth be told she’s awfully hilarious when she fails.  It’s a Jellyfish in a bottle [FAIL].

• Daily Image:

It’s nice to have friends who know boats.  Particularly when they start critiquing classic works of children’s literature.  My friend Stefan Driesbach-Williams recently posted this familiar illustration:

Then he wrote, “I’m seeing a cutter with a loose-footed staysail and a boomkin.”

But it was the response from his nautical friends that made my day.  One Levi Austin White responded with the following:

“Aye! Captain Max has only got his smallest storm stays’l aloft like a prudent mariner, although his main looks really drafty and dangerously powered up.

He seems to have his main trimmed in all the way, but headed dead downwind. That seems like a disastrous combination considering his mains’l tuning. I don’t see any reef points on his main though, so perhaps he’s outta luck.

Any news on his journey? Did he survive the storm? The way the seafoam is scudding across the wave tops, I’d say that he’s on the lee shore of a low lying island, with 50-70 kts windspeed. Looks properly vicious.

Best of luck, Captain Max. May the seas be forever in your favor.”

One of the other great things about the Rural Libraries Conference is that, in addition to giving a keynote presentation, I was also given a workshop slot to … basically do whatever I wanted. One of the things that I think is frequently missing from conference planning is some way to help people with follow-through on the ideas they get or the things they want to try or even keeping in touch with the people they meet. Conferences are often a lot of fast-paced learning and mingling and fun and weird food and odd schedules and then people come home and sleep it off and it all seems like a distant dream when they get back to work. I’m sure this is triply true if you’re at a conference someplace wacky like The Grand Hotel.

So I did a very short presentation called Maintaining Momentum and talked about some ways to keep the energy up. You can read the (very short) slide deck [pdf] to get an idea of what it was like. I did something I basically never do which was get people split up into pairs and give them a buddy to check in with in two weeks, with little handouts to swap email and ideas. We went around the room and talked about things we’d seen that we liked and might want to implement (in the library and just in life generally). I also got an email list of everyone’s contact info (note for future talks: tell people to print legibly) and learned to use MailChimp myself to send a one-time-only “Hey get in touch with your buddy” reminder which was part of what I’d vowed to learn.

It was a great presentation, people were really into it and seemed to enjoy having space for a bit of a meta-discussion about the conference while at the conference. I’m really happy I went outside my usual comfort zone to put it together, very appreciative of the great folks who showed up and gratified that people didn’t talk all the way through this one (except when they were supposed to).

Apologies in advance because this isn’t really about libraries as much as about conferencing. Maybe more of an etiquette post than anything.

I skipped April. Not on purpose. I was supposed to go to TXLA and came down with a weird lingering flu. I’m usually a “push through the pain” person but not enough to get on an airplane with a fever and potentially make other people sick. No one needs that. So I missed TXLA which was a huge bummer. They were incredibly understanding about it. And then there was a week of school vacation where I teach so I decided to hunker down in MA and get well and make sure I could make it to the Rural Libraries conference in Michigan. Upstate Michigan. The UP, where it was still frozen enough so that the ferries we were supposed to take to Mackinac Island were possibly not running. So now I was in a situation where I was rarin’ to go but the conference might not happen at all.

My main contact, Shannon White from the Library of Michigan, did an amazing job with a very difficult situation. She gave low-drama email updates (to me but also all attendees) as we got news from the ferry and told me what the timeframe was in case we’d have to cancel. When I arrived in St. Ignace (via Michael Stephens’ place, so great to see him) the weather was terrible and the flight we were supposed to take was cancelled. Many people including us were stuck there overnight when we would have preferred to be at the conference venue, the Grand Hotel. I was put up in a decent hotel and fed dinner and we discussed jockeying for ferry positions the next morning. I had warned everyone in advance of even taking this speaking gig that I was not a morning person and someone graciously got up early and got a timestamped ferry ticket for me for later in the day. This was a huge deal.

The Grand Hotel is one of those places that is fancy but also deeply committed to service. All of their 385 rooms are different. When I finally got to the hotel at about 1 pm on the day I was speaking, I was put in a crazy-looking suite that overlooked the water. Which was terrific except that there was a crew of hotel-opener people (the hotel officially opened the day after the conference closed) that was going over the front of the place with leaf-blowers and lawn tools and who knows what else. I moved my room to an equally quirky suite on the back of the hotel where I rested after a day and a half of on-again-off-again travel.

My talk about the 21st Century Digital Divide was done in an oddly-shaped room without the benefit of slides. I’ve talked about it elsewhere (short form: people who could not see or hear me talked through it) but it was a suboptimal setup which we all tried to make the best of. I got a lot of positive feedback from the state library folks despite some of the shortcomings and they made a special reminder announcement before the next keynote about not carrying on conversations while people were speaking. I heard it was great, I was asleep. My workshop the next day about maintaining conference momentum went really well and, again, I got great support from the organizers as well as the hotel when I decided I needed last-minute handouts.

All in all, despite a situation where there were a lot of things that were out of people’s control, the conference was memorably great for me personally and I think for a lot (most?) of the attendees as well. As much as people made joking “Never again!” comments, there was something about working together in unusual settings through various kinds of adversity that brings people closer together. I felt well-taken care of and appreciated as well as well-compensated. And, personally, I had a great time. The people I talked to all felt the same. Thanks, Library of Michigan.

A few links for people who like that sort of thing

• My photo essay about the trip on Exposure.co with some dramatic photos.
• My Flickr photoset of the trip.
• Michael Sauers’ photos of his trip which included driving up from Nebraska.

Today, I was given two beautiful and thoughtful gifts from two beautiful, thoughtful and very special folks. And both were complete surprises. One was a particularly pretty pineapple from Marshall, Michigan. Why is this special to me? Many, many reasons. 1. My friend is FANTABULOUS. She knows me – and knows that this gift was […]

This week, First Book and American Federation of Teachers members from Detroit and other Michigan communities helped to distribute 500,000 brand-new books to Michigan-area schools and schools throughout the country. Volunteers from Detroit-area AFT locals helped fill orders and load book cartons for those who came to the warehouse in Romulus to pick up books.

More than 30,000 of the books distributed this week will go to kids in the Detroit area and other Michigan communities. A group of teachers and paraprofessionals from Toledo also picked up books for their students at the book bank event. Check out the photos from the distribution below.

When I was visiting schools in Rochester, Michigan, for Authors in April, some of the schools asked students to prepare a little skit to introduce me.

Here is one of them:

Student #1: Rachel...Rachel...Rachel! Are you listening to me?

Student #2: Wait, what did you say, Maya? I didn't hear you. I can't stop reading this book. I read the first sentence and it literally pulled me right in.

Student #1: What book are you reading?

Student #2: Really? You don't know what book this is? It's Greetings from Nowhere, only written by the best author ever known. Do you know who that is?

Student #1: Ummm, I don't know. Is it Cynthia Rylant?

Student #2: No, silly! It's Barbara O'Connor.

Student #1: Do you mean the Barbara O'Connor who wrote my favorite book, The Fantastic Secret of Owen Jester?

Student #2: Yep. That's correct.

Student #1: You know she's here right now, don't you, Rachel?

Student #2: Really? You have to be kidding. Barbara O'Connor lives in Duxbury, Massachusetts.

Student #1: Well, turn around.

Student #2: Am I hallucinating or is it really Barbara O'Connor?

Student #1: It's her Rachel!

Both students: Now, introducing the fantastic author of all these books, Barbara O'Connor

[Note: The students had read on my website that my favorite author is Cynthia Rylant. hahaha]

English: The seconds pendulum, a pendulum with a period of two seconds so each swing takes one second http://weelookang.blogspot.com/2010/06/physical-quantities-and-units.html (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Most readers here know that I write on occasion in reaction to things in the news. I troll news feeds looking for subject matter for all sorts of things, including poetry. This morning I took my inspiration from my Facebook home page.

A couple of my writer friends had posted links to two stories that left my reactions in a chaotic state of pendulum swing.

The first story reported about a group of 64 high school seniors who were suspended for riding bicycles to school on the same day. You did read that correctly. This Michigan student group merely rode to school on bikes, escorted by police, sanctioned and lauded by the mayor, and then punished for the act.

Can someone point out to me the sanity peeking out of this story? The one official who should have applauded the students’ behavior was the one having conniptions at the other end of it. The principal’s reason for her hysterical reaction? They could have gotten hurt, hit by a car or worse! This with a police escort and the mayor’s approval?

Now you can see the reason for my immediate response. Insanity holds the reins of the school.

Okay, so that’s a bit strong, I admit. The principal’s reaction, however, was far more out of connection with reality than mine. I have my own suspicions as to the real trigger for her reaction.

The point is that just the day before it was reported on Yahoo that a four-year-old girl was kept from inclusion in her class photo because she had her hair up in a bow. Her very neat and tidy hair kept her out of a photo.

Am I the only one who thinks perhaps those presently in charge of schools need a check-up? It seems to me that the irrational responses by school leadership in the past few years are spreading rapidly. But hey, retired teachers can have opinions, too.

When I got to the second story, I could do little but smile. It was about a photographer, Bob Carey, who for the last nine years has traveled around the country taking self-portraits wearing little other than a Pink Tutu. You may have seen the Today Show segment on this man and his inspiration, his wife, Linda.

Bob’s 6 Comments on Rampant Insanity vs. Purpose, last added: 5/25/2012